Identifying and Advocating Best Practices in the Criminal Justice System. A Texas-Centric Examination of Current Conditions, Reform Initiatives, and Emerging Issues with a Special Emphasis on Capital Punishment.

Monday, 06 October 2014

Alabama's New Lethal Injection Drugs Challenged

An attorney for a condemned inmate said Alabama's new lethal injection drug combination needs to be scrutinized by the courts before it is used because it relies on a drug involved in two recently botched executions.

Lawyers for death row inmate Tommy Arthur on Friday filed paperwork with the Alabama Supreme Court opposing the state's request to set an execution date for him.

One of Arthur's lawyers said the state is trying to put Arthur to death before courts have assessed the constitutionality of the new three-drug combination adopted by the Department of Corrections.

"Judicial review of this significantly changed protocol is especially critical because the state of Alabama plans to use as the first drug -- midazolam hydrochloride -- the same drug used in several recently botched executions in other states, including those of Dennis McGuire in Ohio and Joseph Wood in Arizona," attorney Suhana S. Han wrote.

And:

Alabama last executed an inmate in 2013 and has been unable to carry out lethal injections since running out of a drug used under the old protocol.

The Department of Corrections adopted a new lethal injection procedure in September and the attorney general's office moved to seek execution dates for nine inmates who have spent between 16 and 24 years on Alabama's death row.

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The StandDown Texas Project

The StandDown Texas Project was organized in 2000 to advocate a moratorium on executions and a state-sponsored review of Texas' application of the death penalty.
To stand down is to go off duty temporarily, especially to review safety procedures.

Steve Hall

Project Director Steve Hall was chief of staff to the Attorney General of Texas from 1983-1991; he was an administrator of the Texas Resource Center from 1993-1995. He has worked for the U.S. Congress and several Texas legislators. Hall is a former journalist.